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Wednesday, August 13, 2014

We all know
soccer clubs named after famous explorers (Vaso da Gama, Brazil) or ancient Greek
heroes (Ajax, Netherlands). French heroine Joan of Arc (in French Jeanne d’Arc) even has
two: one in Senegal and one in Réunion. Next are five soccer clubs from five
different continents, named after an English knight, an Italian inventor, an
Argentine boxer, a Bolivian pilot and a South African liberty fighter.

Sir Henry Percy (England, 1364 – 1403)

Henry Percy was an English knight who fought many battles for
King Richard II in Scotland, France and Ireland. At the end of the fourteenth
century, the Percy family supported the exiled Henry of Bolingbroke, who
dethroned Richard II and rewarded Henry Percy with as much land he could wish
for. Also, that support didn’t last long
and by 1403 Percy rebelled against King Henry IV and clashed with him at the
Battle of Shrewsbury. Percy was killed by an arrow as he raised his visor to
grasp some air.

In 1882
Hotspur FC was founded, honoring Henry Percy. Percy was called ‘Harry Hotspur”
by his Scottish opponents, for his eagerness to attack and for his impulsive
nature. Two years later the soccer club was renamed Tottenham Hotspur.

Guglielmo
Marconi (Italy, 1874 – 1937)

Guglielmo
Marconi was born in the Italian city of Bologna. He was a scientist, who
invented the wireless telegraph in 1896. This made him one of the men responsible
for the creation of the radio. Marconi was a successful businessman, who for
example founded the The Wireless Telegraph & Signal Company in Britain. In
1909 Marconi received the Nobel Prize for Physics.

Soccer in Australia was mainly promoted by immigrants from Europe. Back
in 1956, Italian immigrants in Sydney’s western suburb Fairfield, were doing
just that. They decide to give an Italian ring to their club, and opted for Guglielmo
Marconi. So their club was named Marconi Fairfield. They presumed Marconi
would also appeal to Australians, as he invented an instrument that could
connect people (and cultures), so much needed in multicultural Australia. The
club was nationally successful from the seventies until the nineties with four league championships, but was
left out of the new national A-league in 2004. Marconi Fairfield, somewhere along
the way renamed Marconi Stalions, now play their soccer in the New South Wales League.

Luis Ángel Firpo (Argentina, 1894 – 1960)

Luis Ángel Firpo started his boxing career in 1917, in Buenos
Aires. It took him until 1921 to get really successful. After winning some
fifteen bouts in a row, Firpo was the first boxer from South America to play
for the world title. He challenged Jack Dempsey on September 14, 1923 in New
York. It proved to be one of the most exiting fights ever. Firpo was knocked
down by Dempsey seven times in the first round, but also brought the world
champion down twice. The second time Dempsey even sailed through the ring
ropes, hitting a typewriter with his head. Despite this accident, Dempsey was
back in the ring on time to continue the fight. In the second round Dempsey
finally knocked out Firpo.

Just one
week before the famous Firpo – Dempsey fight, a soccer club was formed in
Usulután, El Salvador. It was named Tecún Umán, but after the heroic
performance of Firpo, the club decided to rename the club CD Luis Ángel Firpo. The club has won seven championships, the first in 1989.

Jorge
Wilstermann (1910 – 1936)

As a young boy, Jorge Wilstermann took an interest in aviation.
His dad was working as a mechanic at Lloyd Aéreo Boliviano, and Jorge became
Bolivia’s first civilian aviator. He had his own plane and was commercially
very successful. Still, in those years flying was always something of a risk. When
flying from his native town Cochabamba to Oruro, just 120 kilometers south west,
all went wrong and Wilstermann died in the crash.

In 1949, workers from the airport founded a soccer club. They named it Club
Deportivo LAB (Lloyd Aéreo Boliviano). Four years later, on February 6, 1953, this
name was changed into Jorge Wilstermann. The club has won the Bolivian championship
ten times since 1958.

Steve Biko (South Africa, 1946 -1977)

Steve Biko was a founding member of the South African
Student Organisation (SASO) in 1969, giving new energy to the anti-apartheid
movement in the seventies. From 1973 onwards, Biko was restricted by the South
African government to stay in his own home area. Biko continued his political
work, and sometimes didn’t bother about his restriction. For example in August 1977, when he drove to Cape Town to meet members of other liberation
movements. On the way back, he was stopped at a road block by the police, and
arrested. As he had violated his ban, he faced indefinite detention under South
African law. One month later, Biko died in his cell, due to a combination of
brain damage caused by his interrogators and bad medical care.

In 1978, the
year after Steve Biko’s death, a newly founded soccer club in Gambia was named
after him. Slowly this club, Steve Biko
FC, moved up the ranks in Gambian soccer, and finally won promotion to the
highest level in 1988. The club won its first national championship in 2013

Friday, May 2, 2014

Alfredo di
Stefano. George Best. Ryan Giggs. George Weah. Great players that never played
at the World Cup. But there are others who were just as unlucky. They did
reach the World Cup, but not in time. They were veterans already, hoping for a
final miracle. It didn’t happen. Here are six former world class players that
made it to the World Cup a little too late.

Majed Abdullah (Saudi Arabia)

116 caps,
71 goals

Born:
November 1, 1959

World Cup:
1994 (35 years old)

Minutes
played: 2 matches, 90 minutes (45 minutes each)

Voted the
best Saudi Arabian footballer of all time, Majed Abdullah was one the best
soccer players in Asia during the eighties. He was especially successful with
the national team of Saudi Arabia, winning the Asian Cup in 1984 and 1988. In
the final against China in 1984 Abdullah scored the second goal in their 2-0
victory. Four years later he scored the winning goal in the semifinal against
Iran (1-0). The final against South Korea ended 0-0, but Saudi Arabia won after
penalties, Abdullah scoring the third. He was also voted Asian’s Player of the Year
in 1984, 1985 and 1986.

Looking at the World Cup, Saudi Arabia didn’t qualify in 1982, 1986 or 1990. Abdullah
played seventeen of these qualifying matches, scoring five goals. During the
1994 campaign Abdullah played three matches: against Malaysia (3-0, 2 goals),
Kuwait (2-0, 1 goal) and Japan (0-0). Especially at the end of his career he
suffered from a lot of injuries. At the World Cup finals in the United States
in 1994 he captained his team against the Netherlands, played reasonably well
in the first half after which he was substituted. Abdullah didn’t play against
Morocco and his 45 minutes against Belgium were mediocre. He wasn’t picked for
the next round, when Saudi Arabia was beaten by Sweden 1-3 and was knocked out
of the tournament.

Denis Law (Scotland)

55 caps, 30
goals

Born: February
24, 1940

World Cup:
1974 (age 34 years)

Minutes
played: 1 match, 90 minutes.

Denis Law couldn't beat Zaire's goalkeeper Kazadi Mwamba

Denis Law
of course is one the greatest footballers of the sixties. As a young boy he
moved from Aberdeen to England, to nearby Huddersfield Town. He was capped for
Scotland the first time in 1958, and after stints at Manchester City and
Italian club AC Torino, he was transferred to Manchester United in 1962. He was
European Footballer of the Year in 1964, league champion in 1965 and 1967, but
missed the European Cupfinal in 1968 through injury. With the national team,
Law failed to qualify in 1962, 1966 and 1970. For the 1974 World Cup, Law
played only the two matches against toughest rival Czechoslovakia. But finally Scotland
topped their group and had great expectations of the World Cup in West Germany. Law played
in the first match against Zaire (2-0 victory), but was dropped for the next
matches against Brazil and Yugoslavia. In 2006, Law took a trip down memory
lane for The Scotsman: “I didn't think my exclusion was merited as
I felt I'd played well enough against the Africans to keep my place, or at
least to play a part in the Brazil game. But I accepted it, and I have some
good memories from that time. Law's 55 caps was a Scottish record, his 30 international goals still is. Kenny Dalglish got his 56th
cap in 1978 and equaled but never surpassed Law’s 30 goals in 1984.

Carlos Pavón (Honduras)

101 caps, 57 goals

Born: October 9, 1973

World Cup: 2010 (36 years old)

Minutes played: 1 match, 60 minutes

Carlos Pavón was eight years old when Honduras made it to the World Cup for the first time. Players like Gilberto Yearwood, Athoney Costly and Roberto Figueroa put Honduras on the map. Ten years later, Pavón started a career that would outshine all of them. He played for years in Honduras, but also in Mexico (seven seasons), Spain (one season), Italy (two seasons) Colombia (one season) and the United States (one season). With the national team, Pavon failed to qualify for the World Cup in 1998, 2002 and 2006, playing 28 matches and scoring 18 goals. During the 2002 campaign the lethal striker managed to score ten goals, but was kept out of the tournament by Costa Rica, Mexico and the USA. For the 2010 tournament Pavón made a final attempt. He played nine matches, scoring seven goals. In the meanwhile he was already the top goal scorer of his country with 57 goals.

The final tournament in South Africa proved to be a big disappointment for veteran Pavón. While he was hoping to top his career with a great performance at the world stage, Pavón was substituted in the 60th minute of the first game against Chile. He didn’t get another chance and Honduras failed to make an impression scoring no goals in three matches.

Kevin Keegan (England)

63 caps, 21
goals

Born:
February 14, 1951

World Cup:
1982 (age 31 years)

Minutes
played: 1 match, 26 minutes as a substitute

The failure
of England not qualifying for the 1974 and 1978 World Cup was certainly the
biggest disappointment for Kevin Keegan in his career. Especially 1978 would
have been great, as he was crowned European Footballer of the Year in 1978 and
1979 for his performances at Liverpool FC and Hamburger SV. After 1980, he was
still a good player. He proved it at Southampton in the 1981-82 season, which
he ended as top goal scorer with 26 league goals and winning the Player of the Year Award. So Keegan could become a World Cup hero after all, as England
managed to beat Hungary in the qualification group for Spain 1982.

But he
didn’t, as he suffered from a chronic back injury just prior to the World Cup.
He even consulted a German doctor he knew from his time in Hamburg. Still, it
was not enough to get him injury free at the start of the World Cup. So England played the first round without him. Keegan did eventually
play in England’s second match of the second round against Spain, coming on as a substitute for Tony
Woodcock. He had one hard to miss chance, but headed the ball wide. It was
Keegan’s 63th cap, and his very last.

Theophilus ‘Doctor’ Khumalo (South Africa)

50 caps, 9
goals

Born: June
26, 1967

World Cup:
1998 (30 years)

Minutes
played: 1 match, 23 minutes as a substitute.

Midfielder Theophilus ‘Doctor’
Khumalo made a name for himself at South African club Kaizer Chiefs. He was
vital in their league winning campaigns in 1989, 1991 and 1992. Those were his
best playing years, just before South Africa was allowed to rejoin the FIFA
family in 1992. Khumalo of course was picked for the very first official
international game, against Cameroon. South Africa won 1-0 and Khumalo scored
the only goal, a penalty. In 1996 Khumalo was an important part of the team
that surprisingly won the Africa Cup, playing in five of six matches, only missing the match
against Egypt when South Africa was already qualified for the quarter finals.
By 1998, when South Africa got to the World Cup for the very first time, thirty year old Khumalo was past his best. So the 'doctor' of course was in the squad, but only played 23 minutes as a substitute in the
last match. Without making any kind of fuzz, which is a bit sad for such a player.

Allan Simonsen (Denmark)

55 caps, 20
goals

Born: December
15, 1952

World Cup:
1986 (34 years old)

Minutes
played: 1 match, 20 minutes as a substitute

Denmark was
a small soccer country since the early fifties. So it wasn’t a big surprise
they mostly failed at qualifying for the World Cup. But during the seventies their
chances slowly improved. At Borussia Mönchengladbach Henning Jensen and Allan
Simonsen were making headlines, a few years later Sören Lerby and Frank Arnesen
did the same at Ajax. Simonsen had tremendous pace which suited the play of
Mönchengladbach very well. He was at his peak in 1977, when he won the European
Footballer Award. In 1982, while at Barcelona, he became the first player ever
to score in the final of all three European Cups (Champions Cup, Cup Winners
Cup and UEFA Cup).

In 1986, Simonsen
was already a few seasons back home with his first club, Vejle BK, but was still playing for the
national team. He only played 45 minutes
during the qualification rounds for Mexico, but was picked for the 22 squad
anyway. The tournament itself went very well for first timers Denmark. They won
their first two matches and were already through to the last sixteen before the
match against West Germany. Coach Sepp Piontek gave 34-year old Simonsen 20
minutes as a substitute against the country that made him a star in the first place.

Tuesday, April 15, 2014

The
semi finals in the European Champions League have Atletico Madrid playing Chelsea, while Real Madrid meets Bayern Munich. So there is a change that
for the first time in 59 years of European Cups both finalists are from the
same city. Here’s a countdown of the ten finals with the least travelling
distances between them.

At 10: the 1981 UEFA Cup final
between Bobby Robson’s Ipswich Town and Dutch side AZ’67. Ipswich Town won the
Cup, thanks to John Wark (Scotland) and Dutchmen Frans Thijssen and Arnold
Mühren. By air the distance between Ipswich and Alkmaar is 253.38 kilometres.

Real Zaragoza after winning the Cup

The 1964
Inter Cities Fairs Cup was between two Spanish sides, Real Zaragoza and Valencia.
Valencia had won the two previous finals, but this time lost 2-1 to Real Zaragoza. Distance between Valencia and
Zaragoza: 246.40 kilometres.

A very
exciting UEFA Cup-final was held in Rotterdam, in 2002. Feyenoord was lucky they could play this match at home against Borussia Dortmund. Pierre van Hooijdonk
was decisive with two goals, while Dortmunds Jürgen Kohler was sent off after just half an hour. Feyenoord-coach Bert van Marwijk later coached
Borussia Dortmund. This match stands at number 8, with a distance between the two cities of just 210.76 kilometres.

Juventus
from Turin had already won the UEFA Cup three times when they met another
Italian club in the 1995 Final. While Juventus’ Roberto Baggio was expected to be
the big star, it was Dino Baggio (no family) who scored the winner at home
(1-0) as well as the equalizer in Turin (1-1). The distance between Parma and
Turin is a mere 210.35 kilometres.

Eintracht Frankfurt with Fred Schaub right behind the Cup

German
clubs were dominant in the UEFA Cup in the early eighties. It only led to one
all-German final, when Borussia Mönchengladbach met Eintracht Frankfurt in 1980. They
both had a mediocre Bundesliga-season. After a 3-2 loss away, Eintracht
Frankfurt clinched the Cup, thanks to goal by unknown Fred Schaub, who died in a car crash in 2003. The 6th
shortest distance is between Mönchengladbach and Frankfurt, 197.88 kilometres.

Allan Mullery scoring for Spurs

During the
late sixties and early seventies, English clubs won the Inter Cities Fairs /
UEFA Cup six times in a row. In 1972, Wolverhampton Wanderers clashed with
Tottenham Hotspur. The Spurs were the favorite and did win the Cup, wining 2-1 in
London and managing a 1-1 draw away from home. Number 5
in this ranking, with a distance between London and Wolverhampton of 182.26 kilometres.

Cup Winners’
Cup-holder Ajax faced the Dutch oriented KV Mechelen from Belgium in
the Cup Winners' Cup final in 1988 for the number 4 of this
list. While Danny Blind gets a red card, Dutchman Piet den Boer scores the
all-important 1-0 for his club KV Mechelen. The distance between Amsterdam and Mechelen is only 152.40 kilometres.

Wolfgang Kleff (M'Gladbach) denying a Twente attacker

The
Champions League Final in 2003 is between Italian clubs Juventus from Turin and
AC Milan. Both teams fail to score and only five penalties out of ten were successful.
AC Milan wins, scoring three penalties. This is number 3, with a distance between Turin and Milan of 125.51 kilometres.

Number 2 might be a surprise, because this
match is not between clubs from the same country. Back in 1975, Dutch club FC
Twente got into the final of the UEFA Cup where they met Borussia Mönchengladbach.
After a decent 0-0 in the away match, FC Twente lost at home 1-5 with Jupp
Heynckes scoring three goals. Enschede and Mönchengladbach are only 119.99
kilometres apart.

The number 1 is from Portugal. FC Porto and
unfancied SC Braga got into the UEFA Cup-final in 2011. Big brother Porto did win
it, but only by a single goal from their Colombian striker Radamel Falcao. The
distance between the two Portuguese cities is only 46.11 kilometres.

Looking at
the longest distance between two finalists, this is the Top 5

Saturday, March 22, 2014

Although things
never really exploded, soccer matches between East Germany and West Germany
were always something special for both teams. Teams from both countries met each
other mostly in European or Intertoto Cup, friendlies were often forbidden between
1945 and 1990. I try not to give to much attention to all the political turmoil surrounding
these games, but focus on the events on the soccer pitch.

After the
Second World War, Germany wasn’t allowed to compete internationally for a
while. West Germany played their first match after the war against Switzerland,
on November 22, 1950, winning 1-0. East Germany made their debut on the
international stage two years later. On September 21, 1952 they lost 3-0 to
Poland in Warsaw. In 1954, West Germany surprisingly beat Hungary to be crowned
World Champion in Switzerland. In East Germany, people were also very excited
about this.

That showed
two years later, when a club from West Germany played a friendly match in East
Germany for the very first time. 1.FC Kaiserslautern travelled to Leipzig to
play champion SC Wismut Karl-Marx-Stadt on October 6, 1956. The Red Devils,
with five ‘World Champions’ in their team, won 5-3. Captain Fritz Walter made a
stunning goal with his back heel, while diving forward. No less than 120,000
soccer fans were delighted to see such a great team from West Germany, with no
hostility at all. The friendliness surrounding this match sadly was an
exception.

At the
Olympics

As all the commotion
regarding the Olympic Games proved. The IOC didn’t want two German soccer teams
at the Olympics. They preferred one, if possible, combined team. As
East-Germany declined in 1956, a West German team could compete that year in
Melbourne at the Olympics. Unsuccessfully, as they lost 2-1 against the Soviet
Union and were immediately out of the tournament. Four years later, both
countries wanted to participate in Rome. Negotiations were fruitless, until the
IOC ordered both countries to pick dates and venues for two matches in 1959, to
determine who eventually could go to Rome. The West German Soccer Association
was afraid for who knows what, and insisted both matches be played behind closed
doors. The first was in East Berlin, which West Germany surprisingly won 2-0. There
was an own goal by Dieter Fischer and a goal by Gert “Charley” Dörfel, who later
had a brilliant career at Hamburger SV. The return saw West Germany winning
again, 2-1 in Düsseldorf. This time the goals were scored by Joachim Thimm,
Heinz Wilkening and DDR-player Günter Schröter. It was totally unexpected, as East
Germany was allowed to use full internationals, while West Germany had to line
up amateurs without any international experience. In the end, West Germany
didn’t make it to Rome as they were clearly beaten by Poland during the regular
qualification.

Still, it
was slightly eerie, knowing that young men, who shared the same nationality
until 1945, now played each other in two matches without having any contact
whatsoever between them around those games. It was forbidden as their counties were
enemies now.

Meeting in
Munich

Hitzfeld scoring 2-2

Four years
later, September 1963, the same procedure was held for the Olympic Games in
Tokyo, luckily this time the matches were open for spectators. East Germany
were the far better team in the match in Karl-Marx-Stadt (3-0), West Germany’s
response, a 2-1 victory in Hannover, was to not enough. From 1968 onwards both Germany’s were allowed
to qualify for the Olympics. In 1972 they met again at the Olympic tournament
in Munich. Host West Germany met East Germany in the second round, with both
teams having a chance to qualify for the final. West Germany had a strong but
young team with several players, like Heiner Baltes, waiting to sign a
professional contract so they could compete at the Olympics. Still, the likes
of Bernd Nickel (Eintracht Frankfurt), Ottmar Hitzfeld (FC Basel) and 20-year
old star player Uli Hoeness weren’t strong enough to win this match. It ended
3-2 to East Germany, with goals from Jürgen Pommerenke, Joachim Streich and
Eberhard Vogel for East Germany, and Hoeness and Hitzfeld for West Germany.

Big match
at the World Cup

Two years
later, the stakes were even higher at the World Cup 1974 in West Germany,
East Germany was drawn into the same group as the hosts. It would be the first and
last time the two would play a match at top level. On Saturday, June 22, they
met at the Volkspark Stadium in Hamburg. Both teams had already qualified for
the Second Round, there was only prestige at stake. First Jürgen Grabowski
(West) and Hans-Jürgen Kreische (East) both missed a very big chance from a
short distance, Gerd Müller hit the post. Overall West Germany was the slightly
better team, but East Germany won the match 1-0 thanks to a goal by Jürgen Sparwasser
in the 77th minute.

Hell broke
loose in West Germany, after a rather disappointing first round. Bernd Cullmann
lost his place in the starting eleven, Bernd Hölzenbein replaced him. But it
also changed the attitude of the West Germans. They had to step up a little,
and they did so in the next four games. Losing against East Germany might even have
been a blessing in disguise for West Germany. Qualified as number two from the
group, West Germany avoided playing the Netherlands, the superior team in the
first round, and world champion Brazil. Meanwhile, East Germany was very
pleased with their win. During the seventies, East Germany had a golden soccer
generation, and winning against enemy West Germany was almost as important as
winning the Olympic gold medal in 1976. After the match in Hamburg, both teams
never met again. They were drawn together for the qualification for the
European Championship in 1992, but those matches were never played, because the
Wall came down.

Intertoto
Matches

On club
level, East and West met each other all the time. In the European Cups, and
even more often in the Intertoto Cup. Although there was some prejudice and
hostility from both sides during most of those matches. Both countries always
emphasized the differences between the two countries, never the common ground
they of course still had.

In the
European Cup, it wasn’t until 1973, that teams from East and West Germany
finally met. It could have been much earlier, but the city team of Cologne
declined their participation for the first edition of the Intercities Fairs Cup
(later UEFA Cup) in 1955, when they had to play Leipzig. This way, the
Intertoto Cup had the honor of hosting the very first meeting. On July 9, 1961,
Vfl Osnabrück played at home against Motor Jena. Motor Jena won 1-0 (goal by
Roland Ducke), topping that at home with a 5-0 victory. East and West German
teams met again in the Intertoto Cup on eighteen occassions, despite East
Germany not competing in this cup during the seventies. This is a full list of
all these matches, in bold the winner:

Season

Match (first team played at home first)

Result 1

Result 2

1961-62

Vfl Osnabrück (W) – Motor Jena (E)

0-1

0-5

1961-62

Lokomotive Leipzig (E) – Kickers Offenbach

2-1

2-1

1964-65

Hertha BSC (W) – SC Leipzig (E)

1-4

1-4

1966-67

Karlsruhe SC (W) – Hansa Rostock (E)

2-1

2-0

1966-67

Eintracht Braunschweig (W) – Carl Zeiss Jena (E)

2-3

1-2

1966-67

Vorwärts Berlin (E) – Borussia Neunkirchen (W)

2-1

4-2

1967

Lokomotive Leipzig (E) – Hannover 96 (W)

1-2

1-2

1984

1.FC Magdeburg (E) – 1.FC Nürnberg (W)

3-0

2-2

1985

Rot-Weiss Erfurt (E) – Fortuna Düsseldorf (W)

6-1

3-0

1985

Werder Bremen (W) – Carl Zeiss Jena (E)

3-0

2-2

1985

Wismut Aue (E) – Eintracht
Braunschweig (W)

3-2

1-2

1986

Carl Zeiss Jena (E) – 1.FC Saarbrücken (W)

3-1

2-0

1986

Union Berlin (E) – Bayer Uerdingen (W)

3-2

0-3

1988

Bayer Uerdingen (W) – 1.FC Magdeburg (E)

2-0

2-1

1989

1.FC Kaiserslautern (W) – Carl Zeiss Jena (E)

3-1

3-1

1990

Energie Cottbus (E) – 1.FC Kaiserslautern (W)

4-0

2-2

1990

Karlsruhe SC (W) – Hansa Rostock (E)

4-1

1-2

1990

Chemnitzer FC (E) – Fortuna Düsseldorf (W)

2-0

0-2

1990

Bayer Uerdingen (W) – FC Berlin (E)

3-0

2-1

(W) = West
Germany

(E) = East
Germany

Of these 19
double meetings, nine were won by East Germany, eight by West Germany with no
winner on two occasions. A great result for East Germany of course, who
probably were also more eager to do well in these matches, as a win would give
them a lot of prestige in their own country. For most clubs from West Germany,
they were meaningful preparation matches for the Bundesliga season at the most.

European
Cup

Uli Hoeness

While the
Intertoto Cup matches hardly had value to West German teams, the European Cup of
course is a whole different story. In 1973, Bayern Munich and Dynamo Dresden
were the first two teams to meet, Bayern being the favorite. At home they won
4-3 win, after trailing 0-1 and 2-3. So it promised to be an close match in
Dresden two weeks later. Lots of East German soccer fans were very excited thinking of the visit of Bayern Munich to Dresden and went to the hotel to catch a glimpse
of the stars. But Bayern wasn’t there. They were afraid something would go
wrong in East Germany, perhaps with the food, or with Dresden fans making noise
during the night in front of the hotel. So they decided to travel to Dresden by bus on
the match day, which was very rare and against UEFA relugations. Anyway, after 58 minutes in another close
game (0-2 by two Uli Hoeness-goals, then 3-2 and an advantage on away goals for
Dresden), Gerd Müller scored the all decisive equalizer: 3-3 and Bayern were
through to the next round.

No Super
Cup in 1974

Still, not
all was well between the two countries. Although everybody agreed to play European
matches against each other, there still was a lot of animosity. After beating Dynamo Dresden, Bayern Munich was unstoppable and won the European Champions Cup in 1974, while 1.FC Magdeburg took the European Cup
Winners Cup the same year. This meant they should meet to play for the European Super Cup, home and away. But somehow the two clubs couldn’t find dates for those matches and they were never played. Of course, this had everything to do with the cold war between the two Germanies,
they didn’t want to play each other.

It was also not done to arrange friendly
matches between clubs. It was even prohibited from 1961 (the building of the Wall) onwards, until by 1975
tension had eased and 1.FC Kaiserslautern got the kick-off with a match at home against Carl Zeiss Jena, losing 0-1.
East Germany officially didn’t call these matches friendlies - as West Germany
still was very much the enemy - but Internationaler
Fussball-Vergleich (something like International Football Comparison Game).

Looking at
the European Cup history, West Germany clearly has the upper hand in meetings
with East German Clubs. These are all the results, with the winners in bold:

Season

Match (first team played at home first)

Result 1

Result 2

1973-74

Bayern Munich (W) – Dynamo Dresden (E)

4-3

3-3

1973-74

Fortuna Düsseldorf (W) – Lokomotive Leipzig (E)

2-1

0-3

1974-75

Bayern Munich (W) – 1.FC Magdeburg (E)

3-2

2-1

1974-75

Hamburger SV (W) – Dynamo Dresden (E)

4-1

2-2

1977-78

1.FC Magdeburg (E) – Schalke 04 (W)

4-2

3-1

1978-79

Carl Zeiss Jena (E) – MSV Duisburg (W)

0-0

0-3

1979-80

Dynamo Dresden (E) – VfB Stuttgart (W)

1-1

0-0

1980-81

VfB Stuttgart (W) – Vorwärts Frankfurt (E)

5-1

2-1

1981-82

1.FC Magdeburg (E) – Borussia Mönchengladbach (W)

3-1

0-2

1982-83

Dynamo Berlin (E) – Hamburger SV (W)

1-1

0-2

1982-83

Vorwärts Frankfurt (E) – Werder Bremen (W)

1-3

2-0

1983-84

Lokomotive Leipzig (E) – Werder Bremen (W)

1-0

1-1

1985-86

Dynamo Dresden (E) – Bayer Uerdingen (W)

2-0

3-7

1986-87

Bayer Uerdingen (W) – Carl Zeiss Jena (E)

3-0

4-0

1988-89

Dynamo Berlin (E) – Werder Bremen (W)

3-0

0-5

1988-89

VfB Stuttgart (W) – Dynamo Dresden (E)

1-0

1-1

1990-91

Borussia Dortmund (W) – Chemnitzer FC (E)

2-0

2-0

(W) = West
Germany

(E) = East
Germany

In total, only
three wins for East German clubs in seventeen attempts. Their best performance was
without a doubt the double victory against Schalke 04 by 1.FC Magdeburg in 1977.
Again with Jürgen Sparwasser as the hero. At home he scored three goals in the
4-2 victory. Away in Gelsenkirchen (1-3) Jürgen Pommerenke was the star player
with two goals.

Crazy match
in Krefeld

The two
most exciting clashes were both won by West German teams. In the spring of 1986
Dynamo Dresden met Bayer Uerdingen for the quarter finals of the European Cup
Winners Cup. The home match was won by Dynamo, 2-0. A good result to travel
to Krefeld. It promised to be a close game, if Bayer
Uerdingen would score an early goal. They didn’t. In fact at half time Dynamo
Dresden was leading 3-1, and 5-1 on aggregate. During the break, Uerdingen
coach Karl-Heinz Feldkamp asks his team to try ending their European adventure
with their heads helt high, not to make it any worse. And Uerdingen did show character.
They attacked relentlessly and pulled two goals back in the 58th and
63th minute, 3-3. With only 27 minutes left, they still had to score
three goals. But surprisingly, they did. Uerdingen was on a roll, and Dresden just tried to
hold on, but were incapable of doing so. “It was pure fear”, coach Klaus Sammer
said after the game. And the miracle happened. Wolfgang Schäfer scored 4-3 in
the 65th minute, Dietmar Klinger made it 5-3 thirteen minutes later. Another minute later Uerdingen got a penalty, which Wolfgang Funkel put behind goalie Jens Ramme, who’d replaced the injured number one, Bernd Jakubowski,
after halftime, but acted very nervously. The match was won, and Schäfer made another goal to make it
7-3. To make things even worse, Dynamo attacker Frank Lippmann ‘escaped’ from
the underground garage into the city centre of Krefeld, to start a new life
in West Germany.

Televisions
and stereos

Karl-Heinz Riedle (Werder) scoring

Two years
later, the difference in standard of life between West and East Germany was influential in the European confrontation between Dynamo Berlin and
Werder Bremen. Dynamo Berlin trashed Werder Bremen 3-0 in their home match, presuming
nothing could go wrong in Bremen. But Werder Bremen
officials had a trick in mind to make the Dynamo players thinking even less
about the game. They organized some kind
of auction at the hotel on Tuesday, the day before the match. The players could
buy western consumer goods if they wanted: televisions, vcr’s, hairdryers and stereos.
And they eagerly did. To finalize the deals, they had to come back to the hotel lobby on
Wednesday afternoon, very close to the start of the game. So with their minds on the
goods they just bought and carried to their bus, combined with the arrogance
that a 3-0 lead was more than enough to go through to the next round, the
Dynamo Berlin-players walked on the pitch.To be beaten by a highly motivated
Werder Bremen squad, 5-0.